Helen Steel, One of the woman deceived into a relationship by an undercover police officer

Liz Fekete, Institute of Race Relations

And other family justice campaigns

Ricky Reel was a victim of a race attack in Kingston on October 1997, and his body was discovered a week later, on 21st October, in River Thames. A few months ago, 17 years later, the family discovered that the police were spying on their campaign for Justice. More than 77,000 people have signed a family petition seeking an apology form the Met Commissioner and a robust independent and transparent Public Inquiry into police spying on family campaigns.

Mrs Reel, Ricky ’s mother has said, “My son Ricky was just 20 years-old when he was found dead in the River Thames after being racially abused by two men. The police said that they were never able to establish exactly how he died, that it must have been an accident. We spent years pushing for a proper investigation, to get justice for our son. We’ve now found out that because we were questioning their investigations, they spied on us.

There are no words to explain the pain me and my family were feeling, a time when we needed to be left alone to grieve for our son. We thought the police would be on our side and help our grief by finding out the truth.

We know that it wasn’t just us. Other grieving families who were seeking justice after being let down by the police were also spied on. These include the families of Stephen Lawrence, Cherry Groce, Rolan Adams, Michael Menson, Joy Gardner, Jean Charles de Menezes, Harry Stanley and many more. All of these families were spied on because they were pushing for the police to investigate the murder or suspicious deaths of loved ones.

It is devastating to feel betrayed by the people you are expected to trust. Police spy on criminals, what crime did we commit?

We have no faith or trust left in the police. In March this year, the Home Secretary Theresa May announced that there will be a Judge led Public Inquiry into undercover policing but this will not take place for another year, maybe after the next election when we may even have a new government.

I’m calling on the Home Secretary to immediately:

1. Seek a public apology from the Metropolitan Police Commissioner to all the families affected by police spying and take action against police officers for any wrong doing

2. Assure us that that the family justice campaigns would be consulted when drawing the terms of reference for the Public Inquiry into undercover policing

3. Assure us that affected families will be provided with legal aid so that they can be properly legally represented at the Public Inquiry

4. Assure us that the practice of police “spying” of family justice campaigns has stopped”.